


feelings jam

by ThymeAtlas



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Fluff, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Trans Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-05
Updated: 2016-07-05
Packaged: 2018-07-21 16:10:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7394371
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThymeAtlas/pseuds/ThymeAtlas
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>dirk & dave watch sbahj & talk abt shit idk</p>
            </blockquote>





	feelings jam

**Author's Note:**

> i just wrote this on my phone i'm gonna edit it later lol. anyway takes place a couple of weeks after the ending, dirk & dave are sharing an apartment, dave's dating karkat

Dave shifts on the couch, Dirk next to him, the 4th SBaHJ movie on the screen in front of them and required reading in the form of a complementary comic book in their hands. Dave opens and closes his mouth three times before actually talking. Neither of them are wearing their shades; they usually don't when they're in their apartment in Can Town and sometimes Dirk doesn't wear his at all, especially when Dave's having bad days and can't deal with seeing them. Dave's wearing a sports bra and sweatpants, Dirk a T-shirt and boxers. Their binders are behind the couch, on top of the pile of clothes that's building up on the wall space between their bedroom doors, even though Jane keeps offering to alchemize them a laundry basket with kind of an accusatory tone of voice.

"Was there ever anything in the media," Dave asks. "About his personal life? I mean..." He stops.

  
"You mean about him being bi? There were rumors, but there were rumors about every celebrity, so." He cycles his hands, pointing at nothing. Dirk talks with his hands. They're small, but they look sturdy, nails bitten, calluses on the palms, freckles dusting his knuckles. "He was a pretty reclusive guy anyway. Most of the pictures I found of him showed him either escaping the paparazzi in increasingly ridiculous ways or playing nice for Rose at movie premiers etc." He pronounces it like "ets", and Dave doesn't know if it's because 4 syllables takes too much time or because he's never actually heard it out loud before.

"No," says Dave. "Other stuff."

Dirk blinks at him.

"Trans stuff."

"Oh!" says Dirk. "Well. He just kind of showed up one day and started making movies. His past was pretty much a mystery, but there were some pretty enthusiastic conspiracy theorists." He thinks for a second. "Like a much cooler Tommy Wiseau."

  
Dave hums. "It would've been cool if he was. A trans guy becoming the most famous director ever."

"Infamous maybe."

"Dude covered the planet in shitty Lady Liberties, I'm pretty sure everyone knew him after that."

  
Dave also talks with his hands, his movements larger than Dirk's smaller and faster circles and twitches. They're both jiggling their legs but neither of them notice.

"I'd ask about myself but I don't think I want to know."

  
"I couldn't tell you either way," says Dave, and Dirk immediately regrets bringing him up. He still isn't sure what he can joke about, how much he can bring up the alternate version of himself before it's too much for Dave and he'll tell Dirk to move out. Dirk used to think that it was inevitable but now he isn't so sure. "It's not like the guy talked to me at all, about feelings or otherwise."

  
"Sorry, I shouldn't have brought him up." Dirk apologizes a lot. He's overcompensating.

  
"No, it's." Dave doesn't finish the sentence, but he leans against Dirk to say that he isn't mad. Dirk relaxes against his shoulder, glances at him before looking back at the screen.

  
They've been living together for a couple of weeks now, and neither of them are sure how exactly to navigate each other, but both wanted to give it a shot. Both of them have a lot of trouble sleeping; Dirk prone to bouts of insomnia and Dave fluctuating between sleeping too much and not sleeping at all. It's 4:30 in the morning now, and they've given up any hope of getting rest. They've been marathoning the SBaHJ movies all night, but they've been talking as much as they've been watching. Both of them find conversation easier with background noise.

  
"I had my own room on the meteor, even if half the time Karkat was there, or I was at his room," says Dave. "And before that... But on the meteor sometimes it would get to be too much and I would lock myself in my room for days at a time. and Rose or Karkat would snap me out of it, but I still.... it's nice living with someone." They have their own rooms here, too, and a living room and makeshift kitchen even though neither of them really know how to cook. Both of them lived off of non-perishables and bottles of juice for years.

"No, I get it," says Dirk. "When I was living by myself I didn't have anyone to snap me out of it when I would spiral, or just spend days watching TV. And when I was living with Jake I was clingy enough to drive him away but I still never told him what I was thinking so he was never actually there when I needed him..." He laughs a bit, self-deprecatingly. "God, we were a mess."

  
Dave makes a non-committal noise somewhere near his left temple.

  
"This is terrible to say, but it's really nice having someone who's brain stuff is similar to mine? Jake and I just hit all the wrong buttons." And then, in a smaller voice into Dave's shoulder: "I really miss him."

  
Dave bumps his chin into the side of Dirk's head. "It's not terrible," he says. "You should talk to him."

"That's my problem," says Dirk, but he laughs so Dave knows he's joking.

  
"Dirk, you talk to me all the time."

  
"Yeah but you couldn't possibly have a lower opinion of me than you already do."

  
Dave shoves Dirk with his shoulder. "Come on man, that was only before I met your charming self." He leans his head onto the top of Dirk's, hair soft because Dirk actually showered tonight. He smells like the only shitty generic shampoo they've been able to alchemize. He settles onto Dave's shoulder and makes a face.

  
"Stop making that face, dude. Just talk to him like you would to me."

"I'm not in love with _you_ ," says Dirk, before he realizes what he said and faceplants into the armrest. "Ignore that." It comes out muffled.

  
Dave laughs, pokes at his shoulder a bit but doesn't say anything.

  
"The problem," says Dirk, still muffled, and quiet enough that Dave isn't sure he's supposed to hear it, "Is that I idolized him so much, put him on the highest pedestal in the world, that I hated myself even more in comparison, thought I could never match up. So I avoided any chance to make myself seem lesser, even if just talking about it would have saved our relationship."

Neither of them talk for a couple seconds, but Owen Wilson lets out an extended "wow" in the background.

"You know you're doing a lot better, right?" asks Dave, leaning against him, talking into his back. He's still drumming out a pattern against Dirk's shoulder. "You don't have to start dating again, just have a fucking conversation."

  
"Mm," says Dirk. "I'll work up to it," but he nudges Dave to get off him so he can sit up again.

  
They're quiet again for the rest of the movie except for Dirk's yawns, which he acts increasingly embarrassed about even though it's a normal human thing.

  
"Did you sleep last night?" asks Dave. Dirk has his back against his shoulder at this point, knees hooked over the armrest, head squished between the couch cushion and Dave's back. Dirk just makes an annoyed noise at him and shifts around before falling silent again. "Okay," whispers Dave, "'night," even though it's nearly 6 in the morning. The first rays of sunlight are coming in through the window.


End file.
